


Wind on Down

by LadyJanelly



Series: Walk a While [4]
Category: The Losers - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Recovery
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-01-06
Updated: 2015-01-10
Packaged: 2018-03-06 09:28:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 6
Words: 5,183
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3129521
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyJanelly/pseuds/LadyJanelly
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Glimpses of Jake and Cougar in the weeks and months after Walk a While With Me.  Random time-stamps that I had written and then held onto in case they ever wrapped into something like a fic, but they never did.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

Cougar wakes to the sun shining low through the dark blue and ivory curtains of Teresa’s guest room windows. Early, he guesses by the angle. The bed is empty, like it has been every morning since they came back to Dallas. The pills Jake takes to get to sleep are strong enough that he doesn’t even twitch when Cougar wraps him in his arms at night, but they wear off six hours later and Jake always gets up, messing with his new computers or helping Teresa and Sophie get ready for their day. 

Cougar stretches and scratches at the narrow trail of dark hairs under his navel, rolls out of bed and pulls on sweats over his boxers, a t-shirt to go with them. The guest room doesn’t have an attached bath so he wanders down the hall and takes care of business before heading to the kitchen in search of Jake or breakfast, whichever he finds first.

The last thing he expects is the sound of Jake’s voice, quiet but pitched high with distress, “Look, we can get a hotel room until we close on the house, it’ll…”

“Jake,” Teresa cuts in, impatient. “Damn it, that’s not what I’m saying. Jesus, Jake, nobody is afraid you’re gonna kill someone in your sleep but you. You get that, right?”

“’Resa,” Jake sighs and Cougar doesn’t know if he should go back the way he came or out into the kitchen. 

“Look,” she says, softer. “What happened to you was fucked up. It’s normal for you to be messed up about it. I’m just saying that it might help to talk to someone who knows what they’re doing. Someone you don’t have to act strong for.”

Cougar steps out of the hall and into the kitchen. Teresa looks up at him but Jake has his head in his hands, elbows on the kitchen table.

“Hey,” Cougar murmurs and brushes his knuckles across Jake’s shoulder on the way to the fridge. He gets down bowls and spoons, milk and cereal and heads to the table, sliding into the seat next to Jake’s.

Teresa gives him a look that says very clearly, “Talk to my stupid brother,” and Cougar gives her a small nod in return.

“You gonna tell me I need a shrink too?” Jake asks without lifting his head from his hands.

“No,” Cougar answers and pours his Cheerios. “But the option’s there. I’m in either way.”

He nudges Jake’s shoulder and slides an empty bowl his way. Jake looks up and smiles, and together they start their day.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> (So, funny not-funny story, less than a year after I wrote this, we had a major house fire. Looking back at the writing, it's a surprisingly accurate description of the aftermath, despite my lack of experience when I wrote it)

They pull up outside the old house around nine. The sight of it still makes Cougar feel ill. The soot-stains coming up from the broken windows are the only outward sign of what has happened here, but the place has a heavy air about it. 

Without talking, they get out of the truck, walk past the dumpster in the front yard and into the living room. Jake’s said he doesn’t intend to rebuild. Cougar thinks that part of it is that he’s unwilling to live here while he does, but doesn’t want to stay at Teresa’s for the months it’ll take, either. Cougar can’t say he blames him. He looks around at the water-damaged walls, the sagging ceilings with half their popcorn washed off by the fire-fighters’ hoses. Smoke damage up the walls and the dark ashy circles where the actual Molotov cocktails had hit and burst on the floors. Burnt carpet in one room, hardwood in another.

It had taken only a day’s work to get all of Jake’s personal things out of the house and into the dumpster. Computers burnt and waterlogged. The mattress that they’d first made love on. The mini-fridge and Jake's desk chair, a couple thousand dollars worth of power tools, all scrap now. 

Jake looks around and sighs and steels himself. Takes off his jacket, pulls on his work gloves and tosses Cougar a pry-bar.

“Figured we’d try to salvage the crown molding today, pull the sheet-rock off of the ceilings in this room at least.” 

Cougar nods and pops open the step ladder. Jake does the same on the other side of the room and they work together in comfortable quiet. The plan isn’t to redo the house, just get it looking sell-able so they can get enough from it to go with the insurance payment to buy the next one outright. Cougar thinks it’s more for something to keep them busy when Jake isn’t at the salon than anything else, just until they close on another house to start working on. Truth to tell, he’ll be glad to see the last of this one. Glad to be somewhere that doesn’t conjure up images of Jake running through smoke and flames. 

He thinks about the places they’ve been looking at, dingy battered homes. Places that they can make a big difference in a few months. 

“I’m thinking maybe we can work through four houses this year,” Jake says as if he can read Cougar’s mind. “Clear about forty grand on each if we’re lucky and the market holds.”

Even Cougar’s half of that is more than he could imagine making outside of the military. 

It feels like a future. A life to put down roots in.

“We should get a dog,” he says as he slips the edge of the pry-bar under the decorative molding and wedges it up, the wood squeaking against the nails as it budges. 

There’s no reply and he looks over his shoulder. Jake is up on his own ladder, grinning across the room at him. 

“Yeah? You got anything specific in mind?”

Cougar shrugs. _A dog to keep you safe,_ he thinks, but doesn’t say it. “Maybe like Sugar,” he offers instead and Jake nods.

“Teresa and I picked her out of a South Dallas shelter. Used to be only Pits, but they’re handling other breeds now. You wanna go check it out?”

“Sure,” Cougar says and Jake’s already down off of his ladder, eager to get out of this place.

They stop back by Teresa’s, shower and change even though they’d worked little more than an hour. Cougar doesn’t know a whole lot about dogs, but no animal appreciates the smell of smoke. Jake pulls on a leather bomber jacket over a gray t-shirt and Cougar figures this for another of those places where Jake doesn’t feel safe to share who he is.

They get in the truck and drive down, broad highways traded for pitted side streets within a single block’s distance, dilapidated buildings in the shadows of gleaming sky-scrapers. 

The shelter is fronted by an office building that probably didn’t even look that great in the 50’s when it was built, clusters of outbuildings and dog-runs, circled by an 8-foot chain-link fence topped by razor-wire. 

Cougar eyes the security measures, the cameras on the telephone poles in the corners.

“Most stolen breed of dog in the U.S.,” Jake says, and Cougar supposes that makes sense.

They go into the offices and a huge slab of a man with a bald head and tattoos everywhere stands up from behind the desk. A big guy with cautious eyes and a name tag that reads “Rufus”.

“What can I do for you boys?” he asks, and the reception feels less than warm. Cougar wonders what he sees when he looks at them.

“Looking for a dog,” Jake says, “Guard dog, family dog, that sort of thing. Good with kids and other animals. I was here a few months back, helped my sister and her kid pick out a sweet little honey-colored pup?”

There’s the slightest bit of thawing around the Rufus’ eyes. “Yeah, I can show you some dogs. You know the drill, twenty dollar application fee whether you’re accepted or not, then the home inspection. You’ve gotta have your credit check and criminal background check. Adoption fee starts at one-twenty-five.”

Jake nods like this was all expected and Cougar thinks it’s a little excessive for taking a dog that nobody wants anyway. 

“You looking for another puppy or what?” Rufus asks, and customer service isn’t his strong suit. 

Jake looks to Cougar at that, and Cougar shrugs. He was sort of thinking a grown dog, but what the hell does he know about what to look for?

Jake copies the shrug. “I’ll fill out the paperwork if you want to look around, Cougs? See if anything clicks?”

Cougar nods and gives Jake a warning glance. Makes a note to find out what Jake put on the forms before he gives too many details in case Jake chose to get creative with their backgrounds. Sometimes he thinks Jake likes to fuck with the world just to keep in practice.

Rufus hands Jake a clipboard and leads them out the back door of the office, into the noise and dog-smell of a kennel. Both sides of the narrow room are lined with cages, each cage opening up into the outdoor dog-runs that they could see through the chain-link outside. 

It’s chilly outside and most of the dogs have come in, nested up in the pile of straw that each cage seems to have. The first dogs they see are mostly pups, from a couple months old to half-grown, yipping and jumping at the fences. 

Rufus sort of stands back by the door, arms crossed and watching them. Judging. There are a few dogs with pedigrees, a bunch of mixed-breeds, a couple who look pure-blood pit-bulls but don’t have papers. The ones closest to the door are the most cute, Cougar supposes. Younger dogs. After that are adults, in the prime of their lives, sleek coats and bright eyes. A few have clipped ears and docked tails, but most have been left natural. There are a few empty cages then, but he sees dogs beyond so he keeps walking, figures he’ll go to the end, cross over and come back up, looking at the dogs up the other side. 

The next dog he sees makes him slow, for no reason he can name. Body hunched low to the ground, nose up sniffing for Cougar’s scent, hind-quarters wriggling in what would be a hopeful wag of his tail if he had one. He’s brindled black and brown, white down his chest and up his face. His ears are cropped to nothing, and a wide band of scar-ruffled hair spans his thick neck. Cougar stops and crouches and the dog crawls up to the edge of the cage, whining equal parts eager and terrified. Cougar pokes his fingers through the wire and the dog nuzzles in, crushing him against the bars.

“Seriously?” Jake asks from behind him, but when Cougar looks up his smile is warm and indulgent. “You know this is like the single-most ugly dog in the whole place.”

Cougar shrugs, because he could care less how the animal looks, and the dog licks his fingers.

“He’s uh, he’s not ready for adoption,” Rufus says. He points and on the cage-front where most of the dogs have a cheerful description of how friendly they are and what kind of forever-home they need, this one has a blank paper with a black X in the corner. 

“What’s up with him?” Jake asks, that protective and possessive tone in his voice. 

Rufus shrugs. “We picked him up when the sheriff’s office went to oversee an eviction. People were gone but he was still there in the back yard. I’m guessing he lived his whole life on that tow-chain. The collar had grown into the skin of his neck. Half his teeth are broken from where he chewed on his chain for something to do. When we got there, he was tangled around the post, couldn’t reach his food or water for who-knows how long. He’s got another heart-worm treatment coming still and he hasn’t been through a foster home at all, so we’re not sure about behavioral issues in a home. We do know he’s got some serious food-based aggression.” He looks at Jake like he’s trying to stare him down and when that doesn’t work turns his eyes to Cougar. 

“Look. I know he’s big and dark, but this ain’t your dog. He’s not tough, he’s never gonna be macho.”

Cougar stands and Rufus still has at least half a foot and a hundred pounds on him. He thinks he could still take him if it came down to it. “He just looks like he’s had a shitty week,” Cougar says with a quirk of his lips, refusing to rise to the bait. “We just need a dog that’ll bark if someone’s around who shouldn’t be. He doesn’t have to bite.”

“That’s what the guns are for,” Jake adds with a fierce grin. 

Rufus barks out a laugh and Cougar is just relieved they’re in Texas and nobody gives a damn about a few pistols.

“Seriously,” Jake says, “We’re almost always home and most of the time when we aren’t, he’d be with us. We’re not expecting him to hold the fort or anything.”

Rufus looks from Jake to Cougar in a suspicious way. 

“You live together?” 

Cougar imagines the home inspection, the single bed in their room.

“Si,” he says, lifting his chin, “Problem?”

Rufus narrows his eyes, calculating, evaluating. 

“Not at all. How about I get him out of this cage so you can meet him proper?”


	3. Chapter 3

Walking into the gym is an immersion into a different world. Just passing through the doors, stepping into the sound of struggle, of bodies hitting the mats and kicks smacking the heavy bag. The smell of sweat and leather and canvas, the air cool and humid around them. 

Jake, at his side, seems wary all over again, poised to defend himself. Even though his broken ribs and arm are long-healed, he still guards that side of his body.

They’ve come in mid-day, purposefully missing the open-spar hours. Cougar’s idea. To talk to Eliot when fewer people are around.

“Jake!” The annoyance (barely suppressed anger) in Eliot’s voice makes him glad that they’ve done it this way.

“What the hell, man?” he asks as he storms up to them. Jake shifts his feet into a side-stance and brings up his fists and Eliot draws up outside of striking range, hands up, palms out. “Whoa, whoa. Jesus.” 

“Jake,” Cougar says, soft, and he doesn’t touch him. 

Jake’s shoulders relax after a few seconds and he shakes his hands out. His grin is too wide, his eyes too bright. “Oh, hey, sorry about that,” he says, sheepish.

Eliot stares him up and down for a second and then tips his head. “My office.” He orders and Jake and Cougar fall in like good soldiers. 

Eliot’s office is a private dressing room with a card-table in one corner, sagging with the weight of paperwork on it. 

Jake hops up on the massage table in the center of the room, swinging his feet like a little kid. Cougar stands with his back leaning against the door. Letting them work this out.

“Okay, what the hell?” Eliot asks, but he’s calmer now. “You’re gone two months. Come back with scars and a fucked-up fist, fifteen pounds down and favoring one whole side? Can’t return a single phone call?”

A muscle jumps in Jake’s jaw. “I kept up with my dues. Seriously, you’ve got to get Paypal or something set up. Mailing checks is so 20th century.” 

“Screw the dues. You’re one of my guys, Jake. If someone’s messing with you…” 

“It’s taken care of,” Cougar says. Not the smart thing to volunteer, but Jake’s apparently made an impression here and he’d feel bad leaving Eliot to worry.

Eliot presses his lips tight and huffs out a sigh through his nose. Runs through his options and decides not to drive Jake away with his mother-hen act.

“Okay. So what’s going on with you, physical-wise.”

Jake shrugs. “Bones are all healed up. Getting my endurance and muscle mass back. Right hand’s still stiff, but I’ve got exercises for it. The doctor cleared me for all previous activities.”

Eliot steps closer and holds out his hands and Jake puts his right hand in Eliot’s.

“The hell did you punch?” Eliot asks, curving Jake’s hand into a fist and feeling over the ridge of his knuckles.

Jake shrugs. “Baseball bat, tire iron maybe. I’m not sure; they brought it, not me.”

Eliot’s jaw clenches again. “Okay, that? Is making me want to hit someone.”

Cougar thinks maybe he should go, leave them to it. This feels sort of like sitting in on a doctor’s visit. Personal. Then Jake’s eyes meet his over Eliot’s shoulder, just a fraction too wide, too bright. Afraid even here. 

Cougar stays. 

Eliot works with Jake’s hand for a few more minutes. “Bring me the exercises your therapist suggested and I’ll see if I can add some more,” he offers. He turns and goes into one of the lockers on the wall, comes back with a slim bottle of dark brown liquid. The label is all in Chinese. 

“Three times a day,” Eliot orders, “Massage it into the busted knuckles. It’ll help more than you could believe.”

Jake nods. “Okay. I will.” Soft. Contrite. 

“A lot of the guys were asking about you,” Eliot adds. 

Jake’s lips quirk. “I’d like to start sparring again, tomorrow.”

“You think your head’s in the right place?” Eliot asks.

Jake shrugs. “If I’m not clear, I’ll step out.”

“I’ll hold you to that.” Eliot glances over and Cougar meets his eyes. Steady. 

“Y’all go ahead and work-out or whatever you were planning to do today. I’ll see you tomorrow.”

Cougar moves aside to let him leave, watches as Jake pulls himself together.

“Well that went well,” Jake says and Cougar is completely unsure if that was sarcasm. One thing he knows: the next time Eliot invites them out for drinks with the guys, they’re going, no matter if Jake works the next day or not.


	4. Chapter 4

Cougar can think of no better day to make the call. The spring sun is warm and the air is cool. Jake and Sophie play nearby with Sugar, his low laugh and Sophie’s high giggles and Sugar’s sharp barks like the sound of perfectly distilled joy. He pulls his phone out, fingers lingering over the buttons. It’s been so long since he called her. If she had ever stopped trying to talk to him, he thinks he would not have the courage to dial her number, to listen to the three rings before she picked up. 

He can hear children playing, his mother’s voice laughing and breathless as she answers. He can imagine her with a toddler on her hip, the phone’s receiver between her shoulder and ear, the spiral of the cord tethering her to the wall as she bounces the child to keep him quiet as she answers, “Hola?”

 

“Mamá,” he says before he can stop himself, “It’s me, Carlos.”

She gasps in a breath, “Carlos?” like a ghost has visited her. He hears her handing off the child, telling the children “Go and play, quiet, be very quiet.”

“Carlos, what has happened?” she asks, “Are you hurt?” 

And of course, of course that’s what she would think, that he’s injured or dying, to have called her after so long.

“No, Mamá, I am well. I am fine. I…” his words stutter to a stop and he takes a deep breath. 

“Linwood said you had resigned,” she says, soft and uncertain, as if the wrong word from her will result in another year of silence.

“I could not stay,” he says, “I’ll try to keep sending money. It may be less regular now, but I should be able to manage…”

“Carlito!” she breaks in, “No, no. Money means nothing. I want to know where you have gone. If you are happy.”

Jake rolls around on the ground at the foot of the little hill, dried grass in his hair, Sophie and Sugar climbing over him like he’s a jungle-gym. Cougar smiles.

“I am happy, Mamá. I am in Dallas. I am not alone.”

“Oh!” she sounds pleased, and like she’s about to burst with curiosity, to ask him when she should expect grandchildren. 

“His name is Jake,” Cougar says, braces himself. 

“Oh, Carlos,” her voice is soft, sad. “I thought…” 

“He is good,” Cougar says when she cannot express herself, hoping that if he speaks his thoughts that she might come to understand. He is not sure he will be able to bear it if she speaks against Jake. “He is gentle, and kind. I have tried, for so long, to be other than what I am. I have fought myself as a bitter enemy, and now I am at peace for the first time.” 

“Oh my child,” she sighs.

“I never meant to hurt you, Mamá,” he says and his voice is tighter than he meant it to be. He raises his hand to his face, presses in at the corners of his eyes with thumb and fore-finger, trying to hold back the prickle of tears. “I never meant to shame you. I had to go. I tried to be a good man, a soldier. I tried to go with women, but I never found comfort in their arms, only expectations that I could not meet. I am sorry, I am so very sorry.” 

“Carlos,” she soothes, “Oh, Carlos. You are my son. You are my son and I will always love you. Do you understand?”

Jake has stopped his play and is watching Cougar now, from across the park’s lawn. Concerned, but not willing to interrupt. 

“I understand, Mamá.” He takes in a shuddering breath and lets it out. “I will call you again,” he promises. “Soon.”

“I love you, Carlos. Be well. Be happy.”

“I love you too, Mamá. You too.”

He closes the phone and bows his head. Jake’s hand is hesitant on his shoulder, eyes worried when Cougar looks up at him. 

“Everything okay?” Jake asks, and having him would be worth losing his family, but he’s damn glad he doesn’t have to choose.

“Si,” Cougar says, “My Mamá. She’d missed me.”


	5. Chapter 5

As awesome as it was living in a family home for the first time in years, waking up to Sophie’s cartoons and Teresa cooking breakfast, Cougar is more than ready when they sign the paperwork for the new project-house.

It takes them an hour to pack up the things they’re taking—the mattress and box-springs, Jake’s new computer table, a portable heater/air-conditioner for the window. Jake’s got it down to a science, stripping and cleaning the bedroom they’ll use with Cougar’s help. The carpet has to go so they pull it up, lay down a big scrap of unused Berber from another job Jake’s done to keep from tracking construction dust into their bed. Plastic over the doorway to keep the heat in and the mess out. Towels and toiletries into the bathroom, their clothes in plastic tubs at the foot of the bed. 

There is nothing classy or smooth about the setup and yet it feels right. Just the two of them again, like home. 

Cougar looks around the room and feels something missing. 

“Jake,” he calls and Jake looks over at him from where he’s attaching wires to and from various computers and monitors and boxes that Cougar doesn’t even know what they do. 

“Yeah?”

“Where’s your gun?”

Jake sighs and plugs in a few more wires before he stands and stretches. 

“Didn’t seem to do much good before.” His tone is flat and he turns to power up the tower, fidget with the keyboard. “I left it in a lock-box in the storage unit with the house-dressing furniture.”

“Jake,” says Cougar, and he’s not sure what to follow that up with. His fuck-up is big, beyond words. 

His tone must catch Jake’s attention, because he stops what he’s doing and looks up. “Cougs? You okay?”

“I fucked with your weapon. The last night I was here. This—you wouldn’t have been hurt.”

Jake frowns and comes over, and Cougar readies himself to take the blow he deserves. 

Jake’s palm is warm against the back of his neck, squeezing and shaking him gently. 

“That wasn’t on you,” he says, low and serious. “You put on the safety. I knew that. You _always_ do that. I fucked around in the smoke too long, blowing some hard drives to make sure the data wasn’t recoverable. I stepped out that door more than half-blind and they hit my hand with the gun before I knew where they were. It didn’t matter. I swear to you, it didn’t matter.”

Cougar isn’t sure he believes him. Isn’t sure Jake wouldn’t lie to him to take this burden of regret from his shoulders. But he wants to believe, to be absolved. Jake’s offering him an out, and he takes it.


	6. Chapter 6

Jake leaves for the salon, leaving Cougar with a list of things they need from the home improvement store, supplies for the bathroom refit they’ll be starting after Teresa picks Sophie up after work. He kisses Cougar goodbye at the folding table they’re using for a kitchen, and Cougar flips through the sales fliers for Home Depot and Lowes and Harbor Freight & Tool, making sure he’s getting the right things for the right price. 

He’s not expecting the knock on the door less than half an hour after Jake’s gone. He looks out the peep-hole at a man with a badge. He knew they would come eventually; only the timing of it is any sort of surprise. He opens the door, unhurried. 

“Yes?” 

There are two men on the front step, dress shirts and slacks, not uniforms. Detectives then.

“Carlos Alvarez?” the one on the left asks,

“Yes.”

“I’m detective Blanchette, this is detective Watts. We were wondering if you’d come down to the station to talk to us.” 

Not an arrest then. He’s no lawyer, but he thinks that’s a good sign, that they have so little evidence (if any) that they cannot charge him. It feels like a large target at short range—his shot to miss.

He shrugs. “Sure. What is this about?”

“Thank you,” Blanchette says without answering his question. “We’ll drive you; I just need to search you before you get in the car, you understand.” 

It’s the least polite request he’s heard in a long time, but he goes along with it, lets them position him against his own door and pat him down. He walks to the car without cuffs on, so that has to count for something. 

At the station, they take his ID but don’t fingerprint him. They put him in an interview room, the broad glass of a two-way mirror in front of him. He settles in to wait, slows his breathing and erases the option of impatience from his mind. Like waiting for the shot, as long as it takes. 

Blanchette comes in, unnecessarily loud as he bangs through the door. He sets a file folder down on the table between them and Cougar glances at him with polite curiosity. The sit in silence for a long time, and Cougar is amused that the man thinks Cougar will speak first. 

“What is your relationship to Jacob Jensen?” Blanchette asks when it becomes clear that Cougar can and will sit for hours if he doesn’t start the conversation.

“What is this about?” Cougar counters, the poker-face that makes it hard for him to join a friendly card game in place.

“We’ll get to that soon,” Blanchette soothes, “Please just answer the questions for now.”

“He is…We live together,” Cougar answers.

“He said you were his boyfriend.” 

Cougar cannot think when this man could have spoken to Jake about such things. Still, it is the truth, though not the words he would have put it in. “Yes.”

“You love him?”

Cougar can feel the heat rising in his cheeks, but he nods. “Yes.”

“And you’d never have a reason to want him hurt.”

Cougar frowns. “No. What is this about?”

Blanchette opens the file and slides over a half-dozen photographs, one at a time. Jake’s house, smoke-stains on the walls. Jake’s front sidewalk, blood and Jake’s gun lying discarded. Jake in the hospital, beat to shit and surrounded by medical equiptment. 

“This is about attempted murder, and conspiracy to commit murder,” Blanchette says. Cougar’s finger tips rest on the photo of Jake, sick to his stomach. Dios, it had looked bad. He’d almost forgotten, almost moved on. To be reminded in such an ugly way is a slap to the face.

“You think—you think I did this thing?” he asks, emotion creeping into his voice for the first time. “You think I would hurt Jake? But why?”

“Mr. Jensen spending time with his pretty wife again?” the detective prompts, “Or maybe the million dollar life insurance policy you’re the beneficiary for?”

Cougar’s lips twitch because it’s easier to be amused by Blanchette’s assumptions than to try to understand his nonsense. “A million dollars,” he repeats, incredulous. “This—when this happened, we had only been days together. He would not have had a million dollars for me if he died.”

“He would,” Blanchette counters. “We peeked into his finances a little, looking for motives. He’d set it up four months earlier.” He slides three more photos across: mug shots of hard-looking Hispanic men.

“We know you were out of the state at the time, by Mr. Jensen’s testimony. We think these are the men who attacked him. We think you hired these men to kill him.”

Cougar shakes his head. “I do not know them. You are very mistaken.”

A muscle tenses in Blanchette’s jaw, frustration building. 

“Are we done?” Cougar asks, tired of being here with this man and his conspiracy theories about a crime that has already been avenged. If he has nothing on the three men Cougar has killed, there is no advantage to be had by talking to him. 

“You’re free to go,” Blanchette says, “We’ll be watching you.”

Cougar smirks and shrugs. Enjoys the idea of this cop watching him and Jake sitting down with Sophie and Teresa for Sunday dinner. 

“You haven’t been watching, if you think it is possible I would do this thing,” Cougar tells him as Blanchette presses the call-button by the door so that an officer on the outside can let them out. 

He collects his things and leaves, takes a cab back to the house, lamenting the waste of a morning. So much for comparison shopping. He takes the truck to the nearest store and buys only those things that they must have for the project. 

He’s home before Jake gets back, supplies stacked neatly where they’ll be used.

“Hey,” Jake says when he gets in, wrapping Cougar in a hug that smells like hair-spray and the sharp ammonia of relaxer. “You eat yet?” 

“No,” Cougar says, and smiles to see Jake happy and whole, healthy and brimming with energy. “You? What sounds good?”


End file.
